


Poison

by taylor_tut



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Caring Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Established Relationship, Hurt Merlin (Merlin), M/M, Poisoning, Sick Merlin (Merlin), Sickfic, Worried Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-19
Updated: 2019-06-19
Packaged: 2020-05-14 15:05:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19275778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taylor_tut/pseuds/taylor_tut
Summary: A commission from my tumblr! My first Merlin fic in 7 years. Merlin is poisoned while he and Arthur are out on a hunting trip and Arthur must race to get him to Gaius before it’s too late.





	Poison

“Merlin,” Arthur called, faux annoyance dripping from his tone, “are you going to unload the horses sometime tonight, or would you rather they do it themselves?”

Merlin rolled his eyes. He knew that he wasn’t really in trouble: hunting trips put Arthur in a good mood. He was giving him trouble, a habit he was glad hadn’t died when they’d transitioned from enemies to friends to properly dating. 

“I thought I’d start the fire, first. You know, so I can cook dinner. Unless you’re not hungry.”

“Hence why I’d like to start skinning the rabbits, which are on the horses,” he argued. Merlin sighed exasperatedly, but Arthur was already standing to go get them himself. He might be a bastard, but he wasn’t lazy. Utilizing the moment that Arthur’s back was turned, he lit the fire with magic, his eyes flashing gold for only a second before setting the entire pile of damp sticks ablaze. When Arthur turned around with the rabbits, he blinked in surprise. 

“That was quick to light,” he said suspiciously, but Merlin was used to quickly deflecting him. 

“Mostly brush, very flammable,” he explained easily as he handed Arthur the knife he preferred to use when skinning game. While he set to work doing that, Merlin chopped up the few root vegetables and herbs that he’d collected during the trip—loudly enough to scare away a good deal of the local wildlife, as Arthur would have it be known—and stole a piece of fat from the meat so he could cook the vegetables. 

The silence of the night was always Merlin’s favorite part of these trips. He could take or leave the hunting, and honestly, he’d rather leave it, but he had to admit that he enjoyed the time he was able to spend with Arthur under the stars. They didn’t get a whole lot of private moments at the castle, as Arthur was always so busy with meetings and, more than that, worried about what his father might have to say about him dating a servant. Arthur didn’t much care about that part, but if Uther found out, he could punish Merlin severely, even banish him. It was much safer just to keep things the way they were. 

“There are a lot of stars out tonight,” Arthur said, dragging Merlin away from his thoughts. Merlin turned with adoration in his eyes to find that Arthur hadn’t even looked up from his rabbit to speak. He was always saying romantic things without really meaning to. 

“Yes,” Merlin agreed. “And it’s cooled down some from last week.” 

“It has.” Arthur finally looked up, meeting Merlin’s loving gaze and biting down on a smile at the sight of his sun-bright face. “What’s that look for?”

Merlin moved to sit beside him while he worked. 

“Oh, nothing,” he denied, and Arthur snorted.

“You know, you’re a terrible liar,” he accused. Merlin couldn’t help but laugh.

“I guess so,” he agreed. He leaned in for a kiss, but before they could do so, Arthur’s attention was drawn to something in the woods. 

“What was that?”

Merlin blinked. “What was what?”

“That rustling sound. Did you hear it?”

Merlin shook his head. “Probably a rabbit,” he suggested. 

“No, the footsteps were too heavy.”

“A deer, then.” He wanted his kiss, damn it, and Arthur wasn’t giving it to him. Instead, Arthur stood, picking up his sword from where it lay on the ground beside them. Merlin was suddenly terribly aware that Arthur wasn’t in his armor.

“Who’s out there?” Arthur demanded of the forest. A beat; no sound. That was what put Merlin on edge. Dead silence in response to a question was never a good thing. An animal wouldn’t stop moving just because someone had called out to it: an assassin would. 

Arthur looked at Merlin for guidance, stepping forward toward where he’d heard the sound when Merlin just shrugged. Merlin was only a step behind, where he always was, pretending to be scared when really he was more in control of the situation than Arthur could ever know. He had a sword, the one he used when he and Arthur went on these private hunting trips alone, but he kenw he didn’t need it. 

“State your business here,” Arthur commanded in his best authoritative tone. 

From the side, suddenly, another loud rustling sound, this time immediately followed by a shout of, “now!” before two men, both cloaked and armed, jumped at them from different directions. 

“Look out!” Merlin couldn’t help but cry. The sound of metal on metal alerted Merlin that Arthur had been quick enough to deflect the first blow, which meant that he was going to win the fight. He himself hadn’t been so lucky. The presence of a second man had caught him off guard and he was fighting back shakily, his grip on his sword less than ideal and his proximity to Arthur preventing him from using his magic. 

In two blows, Merlin’s sword was knocked from his hands and the attacker rushed him, striking him in the arm with a sword. Merlin staggered back a few steps as he cried out in pain. 

“Merlin!” Arthur shouted. He turned on Merlin’s approaching attacker as his own staggered off toward the forest, wounded but alive. Arthur would have been able to finish the job had Merlin not been hit, but as it stood, the battle only lasted a few moments before the second man followed his friend. Arthur watched them for a moment to make sure they weren’t going to come back before dropping to his knees beside Merlin. 

“They’re getting away,” Merlin pointed out through gritted teeth, and Arthur nodded. 

“Then let them,” he replied. “How badly are you hurt?”

Merlin removed his hand from where he’d been applying pressure to the wound. It was surprisingly shallow for how badly it had hurt. Perhaps the blade had been dull. The worry didn’t lift from Arthur’s face even as he examined the non-lethal hit. 

“Not so bad,” he reassured. “I’m going to treat it. I’m getting your kit. Don’t move.”

Merlin watched him grab his satchel from the horse and bring it to his side, fishing around inside it for bandages and a tincture from Gaius. 

“Were you hurt at all?” Merlin asked. Arthur rolled his eyes. 

“No,” he replied, “so you can stop worrying.” Merlin offered his arm for the bandage and winced as he did so. His entire arm was beginning to burn. Sword wounds hurt like no other. 

“That’s my job,” Merlin reminded him through gritted teeth. As Arthur applied the salve, he blinked back the wetness that involuntarily sprang into his eyes at the stinging sensation that it induced. The pain was overwhelming, enough so that he found himself unable to focus on anything else. He let his eyes slip shut while Arthur applied pressure to the wound and wrapped it tightly in bandages, his hands gentle and careful. Things were fuzzy for a moment and he didn’t realize that Arthur had finished until he laid a hand on his shoulder. 

“Alright?” Arthur asked concernedly. Merlin opened his tired eyes to meet Arthur’s concerned blue ones and nodded. 

“Just tired,” he reassured. 

“Well, it’s late,” Arthur reasoned, “and you’ve lost some blood. You sit back. I’ll finish dinner. We’ll get some food and water into you and you can sleep in late tomorrow. You’ll be feeling better before you know it, yeah?”

Merlin, despite his tiredness and the fogginess in his brain, smirked. “Are you sure you can handle the cooking, Sire?” he asked teasingly. “It’s a difficult job, perhaps above your skill level…” 

Arthur rolled his eyes and punched Merlin lightly on his good arm, seeming not to notice when he flinched anyway, a bone-deep ache in his whole body that he attributed to the battle and the hunt. 

“Shut up, Merlin,” he dismissed affectionately. Merlin did just that, allowing Arthur to help him lie down flat against his bedroll and closing his eyes. The night was warm enough that he didn’t need the blankets, and he easily drifted into a light sleep backdropped by the peaceful sounds of the forest behind him and his boyfriend cooking them dinner in a rare show of chivalry. 

 

It probably wasn’t half an hour later that he woke up with a start. Merlin couldn’t remember the dream he’d been having, but whatever it was must have been thrilling, because he’d been sweating. 

“I was just about to wake you,” Arthur greeted, two bowls in his hands as he knelt in front of the pot of stew. Though it didn’t smell particularly offensive—Merlin had finished enough of the preparatory work that there really wasn’t much that Arthur could have done to screw it up too badly—his stomach rolled warningly. “Dinner is ready.”

Merlin didn’t want to worry Arthur by refusing to even try to eat, so he accepted the bowl reluctantly. He took the proffered spoon, the lighter of the two items, in his injured arm, frowning when his hand just sort of… gave up and the spoon clattered to the ground. Both boys stared at it for a moment in bewilderment. 

“Sorry,” Merlin apologized, picking it up and cleaning it off with his jacket, “clumsy.” He flexed his fingers a few times and they obeyed. That had been strange, but perhaps it was just the fact that he’d just woken up. 

“You’re sure you’re alright?” Arthur verified skeptically, and Merlin nodded. 

“I think I’m just a little more exhausted than I thought,” he deduced. Arthur could believe that, given how much he had to push him all the time. 

“Well, eat up,” he instructed. “Then you can go back to sleep.” 

Merlin’s hand obeyed the rest of the time, now, but his stomach didn’t seem to be of the same obedient mindset. Each bite he took felt sour in his mouth, threatening to set his upset stomach over the edge. 

Not wanting to worry Arthur, he sort of mimed eating a normal meal while he listened to him tell a story about some visiting nobles that had met with him and his father. Each bite was smaller than the last and each moment that passed found him less focused and alert until Arthur’s hands were on his shoulders not for the first time that day. 

He blinked in confusion and Arthur bit down on a smile. 

“You were about to take a nap face-down in your stew,” he explained. The mirth in his face was lost when he saw the near-full bowl. “You’ve barely eaten anything.”

Merlin brushed off the concern like a spider off his back. “Sleep now, food later,” he insisted, and Arthur could just never say no to him. He forced the waterskin into his hands and didn’t stop watching until he’d drank an amount that he deemed acceptable, then finally unrolled both bedrolls. Normally, they spent a few hours just lying like this, intertwined under the stars, talking about everything and nothing—but tonight, Merlin was asleep before Arthur could even say a word.

 

Arthur woke the next morning with the sun. For one blessed moment, he didn’t remember a single thing about the night before: about the attack or the strange way that Merlin had been behaving or falling asleep alone without his favorite person pressed up against his side.

In that moment, he decided to start on breakfast. That was something he did often, as cooking the oats that they brought with them in a bit of water and sugar was easy to do and Merlin took a while to get going in the mornings. He listened to the birds chirping and watched the sun finish rising before finishing the oats and deciding to wake Merlin.

He remembered the wound as soon as he laid eyes on Merlin’s pale face. Arthur felt his stomach drop as he took it in: the hair matted to his forehead with now-dried sweat, his labored breathing. the red flush of his cheeks, the lines of pain in his forehead. He took one moment to calm his nerves before crouching beside him. 

“Merlin,” he called softly, cupping his cheek with one hand in a deliberately soft gesture, the kind that was more typical for Merlin to initiate but which he knew he’d appreciate. The heat burning beneath it was alarming. “It’s morning, love. Can you wake up for me?” He groaned but stirred, his eyelids fluttering before opening them groggily. 

“Arthur,” he muttered. He cleared his throat a few times, which Arthur took as his cue to pass him the waterskin. 

“You’re running a fever,” warned Arthur. “How are you feeling? What hurts?”

Merlin finished drinking and passed the water back. 

“Everything,” he admitted. Arthur winced sympathetically. 

“Let’s see that cut,” he commanded. He unwound the bandage from around Merlin’s injury and felt immediately sick as he did so. The area around the cut was red and angry with black tendrils shooting out from around it in the patterns of his veins. This wasn’t just an ordinary infection that could be treated with more salve from Merlin’s satchel. This was bad. 

“Infected?” Merlin assumed, but Arthur shook his head. 

“More like poisoned. We need to get you to Gaius.” 

For all of Merlin’s anxieties and worries, he had a tendency to underreact when it came to himself. He fretted mercilessly over Arthur and the knights over every little bruise and scrape, but despite that he usually got the lion’s share of the near-fatal injuries, he was always calm during his own crises. 

The problem with this was that they were well over a day’s travel into the forest even if they were both healthy, and Merlin looked like even the act of sitting up was going to be difficult for him. Arthur took a deep, steadying breath and ran a hand through his hair. Neither of them had any idea what kind of poison Merlin had been stricken with, how fast it would travel through his system, how deadly it might be, or what it might do. 

“Arthur,” Merlin called, dragging him from his thoughts. He always was good at knowing when he was starting to spiral. It was like he could read his mind. 

“Right,” he replied, shaking his head to clear it. “Okay. First things first, we need to tie it off.” Without so much as a second thought, Arthur reached for his knife and put a small nick in the fabric of his shirt, tugging until he got a long, firm strip of fabric from the bottom. “Let’s get you sitting up.” 

Merlin was malleable and warm in his grip, and though he grimaced at being moved, he didn’t make a sound. He was able to sit upright on his own, which was a good thing: Arthur had seen poison kill men in hours, so the fact that Merlin had survived the night and was still mostly fine was a good sign. Perhaps they hadn’t used a deadly poison, he hoped. Maybe they’d just been opportunistic thieves rather than trained assassins. 

He knew better than to assume the best. 

Arthur tried to ignore just how much tying up the wound made Merlin wince. It broke his heart to see Merlin in pain, even if it was necessary, and the fact that he'd been the one to insist upon this hunting trip made him feel even worse. Merlin hated hunting, always had, but he sucked it up because Arthur loved it and it was an excuse for the two of them to get away from the castle together for a weekend. They could have gone 1,000 other places, or even just set up camp in a different part of the forest, but he'd had to insist upon the path that had the rabbit den along the trail. 

"Just a little more pressure, love; I'm sorry," Arthur soothed without thinking. Merlin managed a smirk. 

"You're not going to tell me to stop being a baby about it and suck it up?" he taunted, and Arthur rolled his eyes. 

"Well, would you listen?"

"Of course not," he replied. "I love it when you fret over me. It's charming." 

Statements like that, so casual but so affectionate, were always enough to make Arthur feel as though he might internally combust, but he willed the crimson flush of embarrassment from his cheeks and tied the final knot firmly around Merlin's arm above where the black, spidery veins were creeping up toward his chest. 

"It's not a good spot for a wound," Merlin stated. His tone was businesslike, as if he were talking about a patient rather than himself, but the anxiety was clear to Arthur only because he knew him so well. "It's close to the heart. If it spreads—"

"That's why I've tied it off," Arthur curtailed. "We'll be back to Gaius' chambers faster than you can imagine. He'll patch you right up." 

Though he didn't look entirely convinced, Merlin nodded anyway. 

"Then we should get going." 

 

Merlin's head spun when he stood to help pack up the camp. One hand flew to his temple and he swayed dangerously on his feet before Arthur steadied him by the shoulders and sat him back down on the ground. 

"I'll gather our things," he reassured. "Just stay resting for a moment."

It was a tenderness that he'd never be allowed to show in front of anyone else, but one that was welcomed in Merlin's current state. The effects of the poison, though still largely mysterious, were unpleasant. His light jacket didn't feel like enough to keep the chill out of his bones, but shivering aggravated his sore muscles. He allowed his focus to glaze over as Arthur finished loading up the horses and then took his hand when it was offered, this time standing much more successfully thanks to the support from Arthur's body. 

"Are you able to ride your own horse?" he asked. "Or would you rather ride double with me?" 

Merlin was partial to the problematic horses, the ones who sometimes had trouble following without the right rider, and knew that the one he'd picked for the hunting trip would wander if it were left to just follow behind. Not to mention that it would worry Arthur even more to admit that he was still dizzy enough that riding alone seemed like an exhausting task that he wasn't really up for. 

So he lied. 

"I'll be fine on my own," he reassured. He was sure that he could manage for at least a few hours until they would have to stop for lunch and another rest. Then, he could reassess how he was feeling. For now, he’d hope for the best. 

Merlin allowed Arthur to help him onto his horse. He reached for the reigns and was interrupted by a sharp pain that shot through him from his fingertips to the middle of his chest, strong enough to make him yelp and stop in his tracks. Arthur’s eyes went wide with worry, but Merlin shrugged him off. 

“Just moved wrong,” he brushed the concern away. Gingerly, he reached for the proffered reigns again, this time with just his good arm, before gripping them tightly with both hands near his lap. The pain was present but no longer blinding, and Arthur nodded skeptically.

“Well,” he said, “be more careful. If you’re not sure you can ride, I can—”

“—I’m sure,” Merlin curtailed. “Let’s just get on with it, yeah?”

Arthur could take a hint. He quickly mounted his own horse and lead the way, setting a brisk but not unsustainable pace. 

For a while, the movement of the horse was nauseating. Everything was already spinning enough as it was,  but adding in the rapid bobbing up and down of riding through the forest was torture. Though he hadn’t eaten much, just a few bites of the porridge that Arthur had cooked up as they packed up the temporary camp, his stomach was doing summersaults. He worried for a while that he might have to ask for a break earlier than for lunch, or worse, that he’d lose the tenuous control he had over his stomach before he could even manage to say a word, but he didn’t. Instead, he tolerated the queasiness, focusing as hard as he could on Arthur’s ramblings and fighting the overwhelming urge to go back to sleep where he sat.

 

Though he’d never admit it, Arthur found himself really missing Merlin’s constant chattering. He complained about it on every hunting trip they went on. 

_ Merlin, you’re scaring the deer. Merlin, you’re going to alert every animal in the forest of our presence. Merlin, you’re going to drive me utterly out of my mind if you don’t stop talking.  _

Now, however, the lack of conversation was not only worrisome, it was lonely. That was how Merlin worked: he just made himself so omnipresently irritating that Arthur now craved the distractions and the rambling. 

He’d tried to bait him a few times, pointing out things that Merlin would normally point out himself: trees of unusual color or size, pretty lakes, strange herbs. At first, Merlin had been providing normal, if tired, replies. As the hours dragged on, though, they began to die off, dwindling from conversations to one-word responses to just affirmative grunts. 

Just before Arthur could suggest that they take a rest for lunch and water, his heart jumped into his throat at the sound of a loud thump behind him. Immediately, he was jumping down off his horse, fearing the worst. 

“Merlin?” he called. Indeed, Merlin was lying on the ground motionless where he’d slipped off the saddle of his horse. His face was deathly pale and his breathing was ragged and fast, but he thanked the gods that it was there at all. Merlin’s eyes fluttered up to meet Arthur’s, lines of pain creasing his brow. 

“M’okay,” he slurred, “just… got tired.”

Arthur didn’t buy it but wasn’t going to argue. He cursed under his breath. He didn’t know what to do. Merlin clearly needed a break, and the horses could probably go for one, too, but on the other hand, he wanted to get Merlin back the Camelot as soon as he could. Merlin was usually the one who made these sorts of calls. He always knew just what to do and never panicked in the face of danger. Arthur still had a lot to learn before he’d be ready to be King, and as much as it pained him to admit it, he was learning an embarrassing amount of it from Merlin.

The same Merlin who was semi-conscious in his arms right now, bruised and dirty from hitting the ground after falling from his horse, apparently too weak to even sit upright to ride. He pressed his hand to his forehead and winced. 

“Your fever is up,” he muttered bitterly.

“Makes sense,” Merlin agreed. 

“It’s very high.” Merlin simply nodded. He must have felt as bad as he looked. Arthur scooped him up in his arms. 

He carried Merlin often, most often like a sack of potatoes, when he collapsed. From taking poisoned drinks intended for Arthur to overworking himself into a tizzy for events, this wasn’t an unusual posture for them to adopt. 

This time, however, he cradled him to his chest, since no one was around to watch. Merlin was nearly deadweight as he heaved him up onto the back of his horse, climbing up behind him to steady him as he listed to the side once more. At this proximity, he could feel the heat pouring off his body, and he gripped him more tightly in concern as Merlin slumped bonelessly against him, his overly warm face resting against Arthur’s chest. 

“Just hang on, Merlin,” he murmured. “We’re almost home.” 

 

Twice before they arrived back at the doors of the physician’s chambers, Arthur had to stop the horse so Merlin could lean over the side and throw up what looked like black bile. Both times, Arthur had felt panic rise up in him, but Merlin always fell unconscious once again before he could ask him what was wrong or what he should do.

Merlin was practically catatonic by the time Arthur threw open the door to Gaius’ chambers, startling him out of his chair. 

“Sire, you’re—oh, my,” Gaius fretted, his tone stony and businesslike as his eyes finally rested upon the pale, sweaty boy in Arthur’s arms. He motioned to a bed and knelt down beside it as Arthur laid him down. “What happened?” 

“We were attacked,” Arthur explained. “Merlin was struck with a sword. I think it’s some sort of poison.” As Gaius peeled back the bandages on Merlin’s arm, his suspicions were confirmed. Arthur felt queasy again when he saw just how far up his bicep that the black tendrils had spread. 

“You got him here in time,” Gaius reassured. “The damage is nothing that cannot be undone. For now, the most concerning thing is the fever.” 

He spread some sort of salve on the wound before reaching for a jar of leeches that made Arthur’s skin crawl.

“Is there anything I can do?” he asked lamely, and Gaius smiled, though the expression was darkened by worry.

“You’ve done as much as you can,” he said, “and you did it well. He’ll pull through.”

Arthur felt his shoulders relax and he released the beath he’d been holding. 

“Thank the gods,” he muttered. “I was so—erm, I mean. That is to say... It would have been a pain to have to find a new manservant, even if Merlin is the worst at it, and—”

“—Sire,” Gaius curtailed fondly. “You need not feel that you must hide your feelings for Merlin here. It’s alright to have been worried, but it’s unnecessary. He will make a full recovery.”

As if to confirm it, Merlin’s still fever-bright eyes fluttered open, darting around the room before resting upon Arthur’s face with a goofy grin. He couldn’t resist moving closer to stand at the head of the bed, running a hand through Merlin’s hair as Gaius pointedly ignored their moment in favor of mixing up tinctures. 

“You had me worried,” he scolded lowly, and Merlin laughed softly through his nose. 

“Sorry,” he said. “It’s what I do.”

“I wish you’d do it less.”

Merlin grinned. “You love it.”

“No, I don’t,” Arthur said firmly. “But I do love you.” 

Merlin let his eyes flutter shut comfortably with a smile on his face. 

“Love you, too, Arthur,” he replied. Arthur wouldn’t leave his side until the fever broke, so he pulled up a chair next to the bed to watch Gaius work, pretending that he hadn’t heard any of what they’d said. 


End file.
